1. Field
The present invention is directed generally to biometric recognition, and more particularly to identifying persons using fingerprints captured through smartphones and other mobile appliances.
2. Background
Fingerprints are truly the “human barcode” and among the best measures of human identity available. Fingerprints are similar to DNA as biometric identifiers because they can be obtained either (1) directly from individuals or (2) from things individuals have touched in places they have been. An additional advantage of fingerprints is they are readily matched to each other through well proven techniques; however, “traditional” fingerprints represent only a portion of what the hand offers in terms of identity. Other data available take the form of “palmprints,” which comprise a class that includes not only the palm but also includes the second and third joints of the fingers, and the finger sides and tips and the sides of the hand (“writer's palm”).
There are many portable, or embedded fingerprint scanners. Because the focus of such conventional fingerprint capture technology is on fingers however, the palm class of prints is often ignored. In fact, most portable scanners have no palm scanning capability because such a scanner would require a large platen (window) to scan a full palm.